Not only small investors, but big investment funds have also expressed their disappointment about the Vietnam’s stock market performance, saying that they feel discouraged with the way state management agencies regulate the market.

On the sideline of the shareholder meeting of Vinaconex, a construction and import-export corporation, representatives from two big investment funds – Dragon Capital and Jaccar, expressed their disappointment about Vietnam’s stock market.

They said they do not know what they should do now, rather than sitting still and quietly keeping a close watch over the macroeconomic performance. The problem is that the more they struggle to survive the current difficult period, the biggest loses they incur.

The VN Index, the “thermometer” of Vietnam stock market, has been continuously, decreasing for the last several years. The closing VN Index fell further by 6.58 points (-1.37 percent) to 472.71 points on late last week, May 6, 2011.

At the shareholder meeting of PetroVietnam Finance Corporation which was held several days ago, Tran Dac Sinh, General Director of the HCM City Stock Exchange, said that to date, no investment fund in Vietnam has reportedly made profits. Not only individual investors take loss, but even professional investors also lose money in investment deals. The failure and frustration of the professional investors would fade the final little chips that the market’s members are still trying keep.

Investors said that they still cannot predict the prospects of Vietnam’s stock market. The inflation rate remains overly high, and it remains unclear about the results the implementing policies on curbing inflation will bring, especially when the petroleum prices and electricity prices are expected to increase further.

The investors have also shown their disappointment about the tardiness by government agencies in promulgating a reasonable legal framework which is hoped to support the market.

They said that they urged the management agencies many times to try and improve the quality of the “commodities” for the stock market, restore investor confidence, and to set up a more flexible transaction mechanism. However, all the suggestions have fallen into oblivion, and even most active investors have become hesitant to express their opinions. Institutional investors have become indifferent, keeping the “wait and see” attitude, instead of lobbying for the new policies to help warm up the market.

Meanwhile, an official from the Ministry of Finance admitted the delay in promulgating new legal documents. He said that a lot of draft documents have been submitted to the ministry, but the documents have not been issued yet. However, the ministry has its own reason not to promulgate the documents at this moment.

For example, the government is now taking all necessary measures to restrict the loans to non-production sectors, such as real estate or stock investment. Therefore, if issuing the regulations on depositing in securities investments, it would seem to come contrary to the government’s policy on curbing inflation.

With the market on the decrease and the deposit interest rates of 18-20 percent per annum, how many investors will dare to use “financial tools”?

This is the way of thinking of policy makers. However, according to Dau tu chung khoan, the reason cited to explain the tardiness in promulgating legal documents proves to be unconvincing.

The newspaper, having quoted some individual investors as saying that the “investors have been abandoned”, while the market is “getting exhausted and distorted”. As a result, securities investors have been incurring losses, the stock market cannot act as a capital channel, while big programs including the state owned equitization and restructuring program have been badly affected.

A lot of readers have emailed to editorial boards, expressing their disappointment about the stock market.

“The market is too gloomy. Investors feel tired and lonely. Investment deals only bring losses. It is necessary for state agencies to take urgent actions to help the market revive, such as exempting tax for investors, allowing to purchase and sell at the same trading sessions or shortening the payment time,” wrote. “If the market continues to be lackluster, no one would make investments and securities companies would collapse. What will the stock market be then?”

“It seems that leaders and the stock market’s management agencies do not pay attention to the stock market,” wrote .

Source: DTCK